Speaker should be elected
unopposed
HYDERABAD, May 30  In a pathbreaking endeavour for
the smooth functioning of parliamentary democracy, Lok
Sabha Speaker GMC Balayogi today suggested that the
presiding officers should sever political affiliations
and should be elected unanimously from their respective
constituencies.

Evolve consensus, India tells
LankaNEW
DELHI, May 30  India has advised Sri Lanka to
prepare a devolution of power package and obtain as clear
a political consensus as possible on it.

Ex-DDA officers issued notices
NEW DELHI, May 30  The Supreme Court has issued
notices to five top-ranking former officers of the Delhi
Development Authority to show-cause why their conduct in
extending undue favour to the Skipper Construction,
headed by Tejwant Singh, not be referred to the Vigilance
Commission for re-examination.

National health policy to be
revisedNEW
DELHI, May 30  The Minister of Health, Dr C.P.
Thakur today said that the national health policy would
be revised and health for all would be a reality by 2010.

Home Secy to visit
Tripura
AGARTALA, May 30  A high-level official team, led
by Union Home Secretary Kamal Pandey, will visit Tripura
next week for making an on-the-spot assessment of the
situation and reviewing the strategy of the state
government to curb militancy.

WB civic poll: Left maintains hold
CALCUTTA, May 30  The Congress put up a spirited
performance in the West Bengal civic polls, capturing 13
of the 53 municipalities, while the Trinamool Congress-BJP
combine managed to win only five municipal boards till
this evening.

Trial ends in case against Rao
NEW DELHI, May 30  The trial ended today in the
sensational MPs bribery case against former Prime
Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao and 10 others, with a Delhi
court reserving its judgment at the conclusion of final
arguments by the prosecution and the 11 accused.

Congress
president Sonia Gandhi flagging off water tankers
for drought affected districts of Rajasthan in
New Delhi on Tuesday.  PTI photo

Sonia
flags off water tankersNEW
DELHI, May 30  The Congress President, Mrs
Sonia Gandhi, today flagged off 10 water tankers
to drought-affected districts of Rajasthan.

New twist to MP politicsBHOPAL,
May 30  Disbursement of tendu patta bonus
by the Union Rural Development Minister and BJP
leader, Mr Sunderlal Patwa, in two villages of
Raisen and Hoshangabad districts on Sunday adds
an interesting dimension to the murky politics of
Madhya Pradesh. The decision reflects Mr
Patwas pique with the BJP leader, Mr
Lakkhiram Agrawal, more than his concern for the
poor tendu patta pluckers.

Laloo, Rabri flay state Governor
PATNA, May 30  RJD President Laloo Prasad Yadav and
Bihar Chief Minister Rabri Devi today charged the state
Governor V.C. Pande with having been unfair or misled in
granting sanction for their prosecution in a determined
bid to forestall re-installation of Rabri Devi to office
after NDA leader Nitish Kumar bowed out of it.

Heavy rain likely in Andaman
islands
PUNE, May 30  Forecast valid until the morning of
June 1: Rain or thundershowers are likely to occur at
most places in Andaman and Nicobar Islands; at many
places in sub-Himalayan West Bengal, Sikkim, Konkan and
Goa; at a few places in Arunachal Pradesh, Assam and
Meghalaya, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura,
Gangetic West Bengal, west Madhya Pradesh, south Gujarat
region, Saurashtra, Madhya Maharashtra, Marathwada,
coastal Karnataka and south interior Karnataka and at
isolated places over the rest of the country outside
north Rajasthan where the weather will be mainly dry.

New concept of coronary screeningNEW
DELHI, May 30  A new concept of coronary screening
which could eventually prove to be a boon for millions of
heart patients around the country has been introduced for
the first time at Metro hospitals and Heart Institute in
Noida.

2 held for using forged passportsNEW
DELHI, May 30  Two youths from Punjab, Mohinder
Singh and Gurpreet Singh, were arrested from the Indira
Gandhi International Airport, for using forged British
passports for going to Canada.

Hindi scholar dead
NEW DELHI, May 30  Noted Hindi litterateur Ram
Vilas Sharma died of protracted illness late last night.
He was 88 and is survived by two sons and three
daughters.

HYDERABAD, May 30 (PTI)
 In a pathbreaking endeavour for the smooth
functioning of parliamentary democracy, Lok Sabha Speaker
GMC Balayogi today suggested that the presiding officers
should sever political affiliations and should be elected
unanimously from their respective constituencies.

Inaugurating the 63rd
conference of presiding officers of legislative bodies in
the country here, Mr Balayogi said the Chairs
guaranteed aloofness from the mainstream of political
life would enhance dignity of the Speakers office.

"To ensure
impartial working of the Speaker it is essential that the
speaker should not be subjected to compulsions of
day-to-day politics. The Chairs isolation and
guaranteed aloofness from the mainstream of political
life would enhance the dignity of the speakers
office", Mr Balayogi said.

"Such aloofness
will enable the members to look up to the Chair and
respect the incumbent as the impartial protector and
guarantor of their rights and privileges", Mr
Balayogi said.

He called for
establishing of a convention whereby the seat from which
the Speaker stood for re-election would not be contested
and Speaker would not take part in party politics.

Citing the example of
the British House of Commons, Mr Balayogi said "Once
an MP is elected to the office of the Speaker, he severs
party connections and is expected to function
impartially. If the Speaker seeks re-election, he stands
simply as the Speaker and it is customary for the other
parties not to contest the seat.

The presiding
officers conferences held in 1951 and 1953 were
also of the opinion that a convention should be
established to ensure unanimous election of the Speaker,
Mr Balayogi said.

The Page Committee,
appointed by the Chairman of the 1967 conference,
considered it desirable that the seat from which the
Speaker stood for re-election to the House not be
contested, he said.

Mr Balayogi lamented
"It is felt in some quarters the conventions
associated with our democratic functioning do not provide
for conditions to facilitate independent, politically
neutral functioning of office of presiding the
officers".

Besides the role of the
Speaker in a multi-party system, the relationship between
the legislature, judiciary and the executive and dual
membership of Parliament and legislatures are the main
issues which will be discussed during the three-day
conference.

Advocating harmonious
co-existence between the judiciary, legislature and the
executive, Mr Balayogi said "Any attempt by any one
of them to usurp the powers of the other could upset the
scheme of distribution of powers as envisaged by the
constitution".

"It is important to
bear in mind that if these three principal bodies of the
government work at cross purposes, day-to-day governance
would become impossible. Safeguarding the collective
image of the entity of government is the collective
responsibility of all three organs", he said.

NEW DELHI, May 30 
India has advised Sri Lanka to prepare a devolution of
power package and obtain as clear a political consensus
as possible on it.

In a firm statement
about Indias position on the ongoing crisis in the
Sri Lanka, the Vajpayee Government has ruled out any kind
of military intervention in the island country but has
reiterated its commitment for Sri Lankas unity and
integrity. The government is of the view that the IPKF
experiment cannot be repeated, knowledgeable sources
said.

Colombo has been
conveyed that New Delhi was also not going to broker a
ceasefire between the Sri Lankan forces and the Tamil
Tigers.

In case that Norway, the
ICRC and the UNHRC are in a position to guarantee a
ceasefire, New Delhi may be prepared to extend some
assistance but the Indian Government has never showed its
readiness to evacuate the civilians or the Sri Lankan
forces in and around Jaffna.

It was the Sri Lankan
Foreign Minister, who while recuperating in Delhi, had
mooted the idea of seeking New Delhis assistance
for evacuating the Sri Lankan forces but the Vajpayee
Government had outrightly rejected the idea.

The government feels
strongly against any kind of military intervention.
Firstly Sri Lanka has not asked for it but even if
Colombo was to ask for it, even then New Delhi was not
prepared.

New Delhi is in touch
with many countries and Indias policy and response
to the evolving Sri Lankan situation is being fashioned
in close tandem with the prevailing international norms.

NEW DELHI, May 30 (UNI)
 The Supreme Court has issued notices to five
top-ranking former officers of the Delhi Development
Authority (DDA) to show-cause why their conduct in
extending undue favour to the Skipper Construction,
headed by Tejwant Singh, not be referred to the Vigilance
Commission for re-examination.

A Division Bench
comprising Mr Justice M.J. Rao and Mr Justice U.C.
Banerjee issued the notices when it found that the action
taken against them on the basis of an earlier report of
the Vigilance Commission was not adequate.

"A question has
arisen whether the minor punishments like reduction in
their pay and censuring them for their conduct were too
meagre and whether the manner in which the final orders
against them were passed by the central government were
correct and whether the punishments awarded were not
commensurate with the gravity of the misconduct
proved," the judges asked.

The five officers along
with many others allegedly flouted the orders of the
Lt-Governor and granted extension of time to Skipper
Construction for payment of instalments to the DDA for
the land allotted to the company at Jhandewalan and
thereby helped it to achieve its nefarious designs to
defraud both the DDA and innocent public to the tune of
Rs 20-30 crore.

The court also asked the
Israel Embassy to file a report about the value of
Tejwant Singhs property at 3, Auranzeb Road, in the
occupation of the embassy and directed listing of the
matter after the summer vacation.

NEW DELHI, May 30 
The Minister of Health, Dr C.P. Thakur today said that
the national health policy would be revised and health
for all would be a reality by 2010.

Addressing newspersons
here today, the minister said that change in the health
scenario, epidemiological situation of communicable and
non-communicable diseases and liberalisation of economy had necessitated revision of the policy which was first
drafted in 1983.

Dr Thakur said that the
first meeting of the National Population Commission, the
apex body for implementing the national population
policy, will be held under the chairmanship of the Prime
Minister, Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee, on July 21. The
meeting would be attended by all Chief Ministers, Chief
Secretaries and some Union ministers. A preliminary draft
on implementing the population policy would be prepared
at the end of the meeting.

The minister said that
special attention would be paid to BIMARU States besides
West Bengal, Assam and Orissa for implementing the family
planning programmes.

Replying to a question,
Dr Thakur said that the primary health centres were not
working satisfactorily and the ministry was making
efforts to revive such centres. He said that most centres
had four or five officers and the ministry was
considering entrusting each officer with specific areas
as infectious diseases, non-infectious diseases,
maternity and child health care and for linking the
centre with district hospitals and Central Government
hospitals. He said that if such a link was established,
patients would get immense help.

He said that the
ministry would encourage research on development of an
indigenous AIDS vaccine. He reiterated that his ministry
would strive afresh to achieve population stabilisation.
He cited the example of Uganda where intensive propaganda
on AIDS prevention and population control had proved
fruitful.

Replying to a question,
he said that legislative measures to check consumption of
tobacco and tobacco products in the country were in the
offing.

He said that certain
diseases like malaria and Kala Azar which were considered
eradicated have been reported again and needed to be
tackled. He added that tuberculosis was another dreadful
disease that needed to be tackled.

AGARTALA, May 30 (UNI)
 A high-level official team, led by Union Home
Secretary Kamal Pandey, will visit Tripura next week for
making an on-the-spot assessment of the situation and
reviewing the strategy of the state government to curb
militancy.

Official sources said
here today that the Central team, which was scheduled to
arrive tomorrow, would now come here on June 7 for a
two-day visit to review the overall situation and
anti-insurgency strategy now on in the state.

The Central team would
also examine whether the Central forces, deployed for the
counter insurgency operation, were effectively used, the
sources added.

Other members of the
Central team are Border Security Force (BSF)
Director-General E.N.Ram Mohan, Central Reserve Police
Force (CRPF) Director-General M.N.Saberwal, Home
Ministrys Joint Secretary for North-Eastern Affairs
G.K.Pillai and a senior officer from the Army
headquarters.

The visit of the Central
team assumes significance in view of the recent
escalation of militant and ethnic violence in the state.
The Centre had recently sanctioned 10 additional
companies of Central Para Military Forces (CPMF),
including six companies of the CRPF. The state government
had been demanding additional five battalions of the Army
to intensify anti-insurgency operations in the state.

Welcoming the Central
teams visit, Tripura Chief Minister Manik Sarkar
said his government had an open mind in tackling
militancy. "We have no political considerations in
this regard. We have accepted all proposals and
suggestions received so far from the Centre to curb
militancy in the state," he pointed out.

If the Centre deployed
adequate number of Army personnel to flush out militants
then any senior Army officer could be a member of the
state-level coordination committee (SLCC) led by state
Chief Secretary V.Thulasidas. SLCC is the apex body
supervising the counter-insurgency operations. Senior
Assam Rifles, BSF and CRPF officers, besides the police
personnel and intelligence experts, are the members of
the SLCC.

The Chief Minister said
despite the state being surrounded by the international
border, there were no Army units in the state.

The state government
proposals include sealing of the 856-km-long
Indo-Bangladesh border, demolition of 29 militants
camps in the Bangladesh territory and deployment of Army
in the state.

CALCUTTA, May 30 (PTI)
 The Congress put up a spirited performance in the
West Bengal civic polls, capturing 13 of the 53 municipalities, while the Trinamool Congress-BJP combine
managed to win only five municipal boards till this
evening.

NEW DELHI, May 30 (UNI)
 The trial ended today in the sensational MPs
bribery case against former Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha
Rao and 10 others, with a Delhi court reserving its
judgment at the conclusion of final arguments by the
prosecution and the 11 accused.

The case, the first
against a former Prime Minister filed under the
Prevention of Corruption Act (PCA), 1988, relates to the
alleged bribing of opposition MPs to defeat the July 28,
1993, no-confidence motion against the then Congress
government headed by Mr Rao.

The trial court of
Additional Sessions Judge Ajit Bharihoke, who held the
over three-year-long trial, today told counsel for the
CBI and the accused that he would issue notice to all of
them, possibly in July, about the precise date of the
judgment.

With this, Mr Rao, who
at one time had three CBI cases against him in the same
court, is now facing trial only in the 1,00,000-dollar
Lakhubhai Pathak cheating case. He has already been
discharged in the St Kitts forgery case, with the judge
ruling that there was no sufficient evidence against him
to frame charges.

PATNA, May 30 (PTI)
 RJD President Laloo Prasad Yadav and Bihar Chief
Minister Rabri Devi today charged the state Governor V.C.
Pande with having been unfair or misled in granting
sanction for their prosecution in a determined bid to
forestall re-installation of Rabri Devi to office after
NDA leader Nitish Kumar bowed out of it.

Contesting the
accusations by the CBI against the Laloo-Rabri duo for
framing of charges in the disproportionate assets case in
the court of the designated CBI Judge, S.K. Lal, their
counsel, P.N. Pandey and Chittranjan Sinha, said the
Governor had granted sanction for their prosecution on
March 10, 2000, the day NDA leader Nitish Kumar, resigned
without seeking a confidence vote in the state Assembly.

Mr Pandey said the CBI
had approached the Governor seeking their prosecution on
March 5, 2000, two days after Nitish Kumar became the
Chief Minister.

And till the date of the
CBI approaching the Governor or the latter permitting the
agency to prosecute them there was no material evidence
produced by the CBI with respect to agriculture income of
Rabri Devi, he said asking what had compelled the
Governor to sanction prosecution the day Nitish Kumar
resigned.

More so the CBI
collected the evidence regarding Rabri Devis
agriculture income between March 24,2000 and April 2,
2000, he claimed and accused the Governor of having asked
the investigating agency to collect evidence regarding
her agriculture income.

The Governors
action asking the CBI to collect evidence against Rabri
Devi with respect to her agriculture income appears to be
malafide and influenced, Mr Pandey said.

"It is not the
function of the Governor to ask for collection of
evidence", he said.

BHOPAL, May 30 
Disbursement of tendu patta bonus by the Union Rural
Development Minister and BJP leader, Mr Sunderlal Patwa,
in two villages of Raisen and Hoshangabad districts on
Sunday adds an interesting dimension to the murky
politics of Madhya Pradesh. The decision reflects Mr
Patwas pique with the BJP leader, Mr Lakkhiram
Agrawal, more than his concern for the poor tendu patta
pluckers.

As Chief Minister
(1990-1992), Mr Patwa had not only described as fraud the
process of cooperatisation of tendu patta collection and
payment of bonus but also tried to reverse the process,
mainly to benefit Mr Agrawal, then Mr Patwas protégé.

It is a fascinating story. Tendu patta is used for making bidis. Madhya
Pradesh accounts for over 60 per cent of the
countrys total production of tendu leaves and lakhs
of the poor, mainly tribal, families are engaged in the
tendu patta collection every season. Collection storage
and trade of tendu patta were in private hands.

On her return to power
in 1980, Mrs Indira Gandhi wrote a letter to Chief
Ministers asking them to strive for giving some sort of
ownership rights to the tribals on the forest produce. Mr
Arjun Singh sat over Mrs Gandhis letter during his
entire five-year term.

Mr Arjun Singh returned
to the state as Chief Minister in 1988 and chose the
backward Kharsia constituency in the remote Raigarh
district of Chhattisgarh region to enter the Assembly.
Pitted against him was the BJPs, Mr Dilip Singh
Judeo, whose election was managed by Mr Lakkhiram
Agrawal, the then biggest tendu patta trader of
Chhattisgarh.

Mr Arjun Singh was
literally made to sweat it out and he had used the
government machinery unashamedly to win the election. He
scraped through by a small margin of 8,000 votes.

Once settled at Vallabh
Bhavan (state secretariat) firmly, Mr Singh retrieved the
eight-year-old letter of Mrs Gandhi, and in one stroke,
took the tendu patta collection from the hands of private
parties, announced formation of co-operatives of tendu
patta pluckers and deputed the entire government
machinery, the District Collector downwards, in the
collection work. Mr Lakkhiram Agrawals tendu patta
trade crashed almost overnight.

With most of the
collection charges having been paid from the government
treasury, Mr Singh even announced bonus for the tendu
patta pluckers.

The BJP government of Mr
Patwa took office in 1990. Mr Patwa stubbornly refused to
pay Rs 112.5 crore as bonus to tendu patta pluckers
saying that it was all a fraud and fake co-operative
societies had been constituted. Mr Patwa also privatised
part of tendu patta collection to help Mr Lakkhiram
Agrawal who had by then become Mr Patwas trusted
lieutenant. (Mr Patwa, who is compared only with Mr Arjun
Singh in political manipulations, got Mr Agrawal elected
president of the state unit twice). Mr Patwas move
to hand over tendu patta collection to private parties
once again was reversed after the dismissal of the BJP
government in December, 1992.

Now Mr Patwa and Mr
Agrawal are after each others throat over the issue
of dominance in the Chhattisgarh region. Mr Agrawal, in
charge of the Madhya Pradesh affairs, is disturbing Mr
Patwas base in the state in every manner possible.
And a piqued Mr Patwa chose to disburse tendu patta bonus
and admit indirectly that his own policy on tendu patta
eight years ago was wrong. Cooperatisation of tendu patta
collection is still a sore point with Mr Lakkhiram
Agrawal.

PUNE, May 30 (PTI)
 Forecast valid until the morning of June 1: Rain
or thundershowers are likely to occur at most places in
Andaman and Nicobar Islands; at many places in
sub-Himalayan West Bengal, Sikkim, Konkan and Goa; at a
few places in Arunachal Pradesh, Assam and Meghalaya,
Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura, Gangetic West
Bengal, west Madhya Pradesh, south Gujarat region,
Saurashtra, Madhya Maharashtra, Marathwada, coastal
Karnataka and south interior Karnataka and at isolated
places over the rest of the country outside north
Rajasthan where the weather will be mainly dry.

Heavy rainfall warning:
Heavy rain is likely to occur at isolated places in
Andaman and Nicobar Islands during the next 48 hours.

Temperatures recorded in
four metropolitan cities in degrees Celsius:

Mumbai Max 32 (-1 ) Min
27 (N)

New Delhi Max 43 (+2 )
Min 33 (+5)

Calcutta Max 30 (-5) Min
27 (N)

Chennai Max 39 (+1) Min
29 (+1)

The trough on sea level
chart from Punjab to north-east Bay across south Uttar
Pradesh persists and extends up to lower tropospheric
levels. The trough on sea level chart extending up to
lower levels from the Gujarat coast to the Kerala coast
also persists.

A western disturbance as
an upper air system lies over north Pakistan and
neighbourhood. A trough on sea level chart lies
south-east Bay and adjoining Andaman Sea.

The cyclonic circulation
between 2.1 and 5.8 km a.s.l. over south Maharashtra
coast and adjoining Karnataka coast has become less marked.
The other cyclonic circulation between 3.1 and 5.8 km
a.s.l. over south the Andhra coast and neighbourhood has
also become less marked. The western disturbance as an
upper air system over north Pakistan and adjoining parts
of Jammu and Kashmir has moved away.

Rain or thundershowers
have occurred at most places in Konkan and Goa and
Marathwada; at many places in Andaman and Nicobar
Islands, Assam and Meghalaya, Himachal Pradesh and
coastal Karnataka; at a few places in Nagaland, Manipur,
Mizoram and Tripura, sub-Himalayan West Bengal and
Sikkim, Jammu and Kashmir, west Madhya Pradesh and
Vidarbha and at isolated places in Gangetic west Bengal,
Orissa, east Rajasthan.

NEW DELHI, May 30 
A new concept of coronary screening which could
eventually prove to be a boon for millions of heart
patients around the country has been introduced for the
first time at Metro hospitals and Heart Institute in
Noida.

While the gold standard
coronary angiography has over the years become one of the
most reliable methods of identifying blocks in the
arteries, the new method introduced at the Metro hospital
by its founder, Dr Purshotam Lal, could soon be the most
sought after as it does not involve the discomfort,
vascular complications and the psychological unacceptance
of the earlier process.

The new concept, named
as "Metro Coronary Screening" is probably the
first of its kind in the world which deals specially with
the limitations of conventional coronary angiography like
hospitalisation, discomfort, dye reactions, cost phobia,
psychological unacceptance of the procedural site. It is
based on the "fluid dynamics" formulas of
physics according to which the pressure generated at the
tip of the catheter will be much more if the catheter is
smaller in size with much less radius and the volume of
dye required to scan the coronary arteries comes out to
be much less when it is compared with the volume of dye
used in conventional coronary angiography thus reducing
the side effects.

According to Dr Lal, if
you apply some additional force while injecting it can
indeed work like a power injection and 1 cc dye itself
could scan the coronary arteries. Secondly, the site of
procedure is from the elbow area which is being used to
take blood samples and is the most acceptable site among
Indian population from the psychological point of view.

The procedure of MCS is
carried out on an outpatient basis and could benefit
high-risk individuals over the age of 30 having two or
more risk factors like smoking diabetes, hypertension,
high cholesterol, strong family history etc. It could
also be used in patients who have been advised
conventional coronary angiography.

The procedure does not
require any preparation whatsoever. It takes 5-10 minutes
and the individual can go back home or to workplace
within an hour. It involves the use of a tiny catheter of
about 1mm in diameter and a small amount of dye.
Necessary blood tests are taken at the time of procedure
from the same site. It is the final test and one does not
require any conventional coronary angiography afterwards.

Dr Lal said the most
important aspect of the procedure was that it was cost-effective and the total package, including
echocardiography, blood tests and coronary screening
along with video cassette came out to Rs 10,000.

Dr Lal, who has
introduced the largest number of new procedures for the
first time in India like drilling, atherectomy, stenting,
heart hole closure etc, has already performed more than
500 cases of MCS without any failure or complications.

According to Dr Lal, the
MCS which has proved to be a safer procedure could help
to a great extent to decide the role of alternate
medicine or modern medicine and showing an ultimate way
to conquer heart attacks.

NEW DELHI, May 30 
Two youths from Punjab, Mohinder Singh and Gurpreet
Singh, were arrested from the Indira Gandhi International
(IGI) Airport, for using forged British passports for
going to Canada.

The passports of the
accused had photo replacement on its cover page and
Indian visa on the passports were chemically washed and
re-written, the Foreign Regional Registration Officer
(FRRO), Mr P.K. Bhardwaj, said.

During interrogation
they confessed that these passports were actually issued
to two women of Indian origin who had lost them at the
Delhi airport when the women came from Britain last year.
They had reported the matter to police station, at the
IGI Airport, the FRRO said.

The accused disclosed
that they wanted to go to Canada for employment but did
not get visa for Canada. They had contacted an agent at
Pahar Ganj in Central Delhi who reportedly managed the
travel documents for them for Canada for which he
demanded Rs 3 lakh for each. Each one paid Rs 1 lakh in
advance to the agent and remaining was to be paid after
their safe entry into Canada.

They also had their
genuine Indian passports on which they went to Hong Kong
by an Air India flight as the agent instructed them that
immigration officials at the Delhi Airport would detect
the forgery.

They were to catch a
flight for Toronto from Hong Kong but were not allowed
and sent back to Delhi, the FRRO said.

NEW DELHI, May 30 (UNI)
 Noted Hindi litterateur Ram Vilas Sharma died of
protracted illness late last night. He was 88 and is
survived by two sons and three daughters.

According to family
sources, Mr Sharma was suffering from a prolonged cardiac
illness and the end came here little after midnight.

The litterateur was on
Sunday honoured with the Shatabdi Samman of The Hindi
Academy, which included a cheque for Rs 11 lakh at a
simple ceremony at his home by Delhi Chief Minister
Sheila Dikshit.

Mr Sharma was born on
October 12, 1912, and began his professional career as an
English lecturer at Lucknow University.

NATIONAL BRIEFS

Appoint
new head in GI Surgery DeptNEW
DELHI: The Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT)
has directed the Centre to appoint a qualified and
experienced doctor to the head the Gastro Intestinal (GI)
Surgery Department in G.B. Pant Hospital in place of the
incumbent who does not have the "necessary
qualifications". A Division Bench comprising
CATs Vice-Chairman V. Rajagopala Reddy and Shanta
Shatry (member) while deciding a petition challenging
handing over the charge of the department to Dr Adarsh
Chaudhary, a professor of general surgery, said it was
not proper to give him responsibility of such a
superspeciality department.  PTI

SC vacates stay
on Lalbagh trustINDORE:
The Supreme Court has vacated the stay on Lalbagh trust
given by the Indore Bench of the Madhya Pradesh High
Court, paving the way for the development of historical
Lalbagh building of the erstwhile ruler, Holkars of
Indore, official sources said here on Tuesday. The stay
was vacated by a two-member bench of the Supreme Court
comprising Mr Justice B.N. Kripal and Mr Justice Syed
Mohammad Quaori last week, sources added. 
PTI

39 cr Japanese
aid for polio driveNEW
DELHI: The Japanese Government on Tuesday agreed
to extend to UNICEF a 956 million yen (approximately Rs
39 crore) grant assistance for their project for
eradication of poliomyelitis in India. An agreement to
this effect was signed between Mr Nobuaki Ito,
Charged Affaires of Japan in India, and Mr Alan
Court, the UNICEF representative, at a function at the
Japanese Embassy here.  UNI

Anna University is
UNESCOs partnerCHENNAI:
Anna University, the Chennai-based premier technological
institution, has been identified as a partner university
of UNESCOs International Centre for Engineering
Education (UICEE), Australia. The Universitys
Vice-Chancellor, Dr A. Kalanidhi, in his annual report on
the performance of the university, said that Anna
University was the first Asian university to obtain this
status, which meant that the institution could share
UNESCOs resources and expertise in education and
research.  PTI

Recognition for
numismatic centreNASHIK:
A tiny village in Maharashtra has become one of the best
known destinations in the world for the study of coins.
Foreign researchers regularly visit the Indian Institute
of Research in Numismatic Studies (IIRNS), situated at
Anjaneri village in Nashik district, a storehouse of
vital information on numismatics, or the study of coins.
The institute, founded in 1984, houses a gallery of coins
and has miniature coin factories of various periods. The
only institute of its kind in Asia, it has launched
extensive studies on Roman and Greek coins apart from
Indian coins.  UNI

Dawood aide
granted bailMUMBAI:
Mohammed Ahmed Mansoor, who allegedly helped
conspirators of the serial bomb blasts here in 1993 to
get arms training in Pakistan, has been granted bail
after five years in jail. Judge P.D. Kode of the
designated TADA court last week granted Mansoor bail for
a sum of Rs 3 lakh. The judge, however, rejected the bail
plea of co-accused Munna.  PTI

12 killed as
truck overturnsLUCKNOW:
Twelve persons were killed and as many injured when a
sand-laden truck in which they were travelling overturned
near village Bij in Unnao district, police reports
received here said on Tuesday. The accident occurred on
Monday when the truck driver lost control while trying to
avoid a vehicle coming from the opposite direction, the
police said adding that truck was on its way to Lucknow
from Unnao.  UNI

Normal life hit
in AssamGUWAHATI:
Normal life has been hit in Assams Nagaon and Karbi
Anglong districts in a 12-hour bandh on Tuesday called by
the banned ULFA, official reports received here said. The
bandh has been called by ULFA to protest against the
killing of its top-ranking leader Swadhinata Phukan,
alias Kabiranjan Saikia, in an encounter with security
forces in Jorhat district on May 27.  PTI

Separate jail
for women NEW
DELHI: A newly constructed central prison
equipped with various facilities and exclusively for
women with a capacity of 450 inmates will be inaugurated
this week at the capitals Tihar Jail complex. At
present, all female prisoners are lodged in the
overcrowded womens ward of Central Jail no 1 with a
population of over 500 inmates, including 60 children
below six years. They will all be shifted to the new
prison spread over an area of 6.25 acres. 
UNI